Saint Dositheos the Recluse (+ 1776)

St. Dositheos the Recluse (Feast Day - September 25)

This is the story of how a young girl named Daria, became a serf named Dositheos, who lived for decades as a recluse, and gave the blessing to Saint Seraphim to go to Sarov.

Daria was born in 1721 to the noble Tiapkin family in the province of Riazan. Before she was born, her grandmother entered the Monastery of the Ascension at the Moscow Kremlin and took the name Porphyria. When Daria was two years old she visited her grandmother with her parents, and when her grandmother saw her she insisted Daria remain in the monastery with her to be dedicated to God and the patroness of the monastery, Saint Euphrosyne. The parents reluctantly allowed their child to remain with her grandmother in the monastery. With her grandmother, Daria was educated and learned to love the monastic way of life of asceticism and prayer.

The Authenticity of the Conversation Between St. Seraphim of Sarov and Nicholas Motovilov

Though it is without doubt St. Seraphim of Sarov was a holy figure, a model of piety and is an intercessor in time of need, his canonization in July of 1903 was the result of strange circumstances. On July 18, 1903 about 300,000 people together with Tsar Nicholas II and the royal family attended the canonization at the Cathedral of the Dormition in Sarov. The climax of the event was the opening of the coffin, and the veneration of the relics which took all day and night. The crowd was so pressed that a woman gave birth at the emperor's feet, who promptly offered to be the child's godfather. The degree of access to the emperor's person remained impressive and novel.

Tsar Nicholas II had to twist the arm of the reluctant Church authorities to secure the decree of canonization for Seraphim of Sarov, which was difficult to get approved in light of the fact that in the two previous centuries there had only been five canonizations until Nicholas II took up the cause. Seraphim of Sarov was not very popular at the time outside the local area, so the tsar had to campaign, and eventually it was approved. However, there were setbacks. When the coffin was opened, the Saint's relics had been decomposed. Though incorruption is not necessary for canonization, the poor condition of the relics was exploited by the tsar's political opponents and the Old Believers. Popular enthusiasm was not dampened however.

Saint Martha of Diveyevo (+ 1829)

St. Martha of Diveyevo (Feast Day - August 21)

Venerable Martha (in the world Maria Semenovna Miliukova) was born Feb. 10, 1810 to a peasant family of the Nizhny-Novgorod province, Ardatsky district, village of Pogiblo (now Malinovka; “Robin”). The Miliukov household, righteous and of a godly life, was close to Elder Seraphim of Sarov. Besides Maria there were two other older children—a sister Praskovya Semenovna and a brother Ivan Semenovich. With the blessing of Venerable Seraphim of Sarov, Praskovya Semenovna entered the Diveyevo community and attained to a high spiritual life. Upon the death of his spouse Ivan entered the Sarov Hermitage.

Saint Pelagia the Fool for Christ of Diveyevo (+ 1884)

St. Pelagia of Diveyevo (Feast Day - January 30)

In the world she was known as Pelagia Ivanovna Serebrennikova. She was born in Arzamas to parents named Ivan and Parasceva, and she had two brothers named Andrew and John. In her childhood her father died, and her mother remarried a strict man named Alexei. As a child she came down with a severe illness, making her bedridden for a very long time. When she finally recovered, it was as if she was a different person, doing foolish things often. For example, she would go out to the garden in the middle of the winter, she would lift up her skirt in public, she would stand on one leg and spin around like a ballerina, and would scream for no reason. Her parents would punish her for these things, but her behavior did not change. Already from childhood she was nicknamed "fool" for her unusual behavior, and years later her mother understood that she was gifted at this time with the grace of foolishness for the sake of Christ.

On the Acquisition of the Holy Spirit (The Conversation of St. Seraphim of Sarov with Nicholas Motovilov)

Introduction

In November of 1831, a pious Orthodox Christian named Nicholas Motovilov met with Saint Seraphim, and recorded his conversation. The notes by Motovilov were transcribed and published by Sergius Nilus, who wrote the following introduction:

This revelation is undoubtedly of worldwide significance. True, there is nothing essentially new in it, for the full revelation was given to the Apostles from the very day of Pentecost. But now that people have forgotten the fundamental truths of Christian life and are immersed in the darkness of materialism or the exterior and routine performance of "ascetic labors," St. Seraphim's revelation is truly extraordinary, as indeed he himself regarded it.

"It is not given to you alone to understand this," said St. Seraphim towards the end of the revelation, "but through you it is for the whole world!" Like a flash of lightning this wonderful conversation illumined the whole world which was already immersed in spiritual lethargy and death less than a century before the struggle against Christianity in Russia and at a time when Christian faith was at a low ebb in the West. Here God's Saint appears before us in no way inferior to the prophets through whom the Holy Spirit Himself spoke.

Saint Seraphim of Sarov Resource Page

St. Seraphim of Sarov (Feast Days - January 2; July 19)

 

About

 

Saint Seraphim the Wonderworker of Sarov (+ 1833)

  

Saint Seraphim of Sarov as a Model for our Lives

 

Iconographic Depictions of the Life of St. Seraphim of Sarov

  

Animation of St. Seraphim of Sarov

  

Saint Seraphim and Russia

 

Pascha in the Midst of Summer: Venerable Seraphim of Sarov (St. John Maximovitch) 

Homily on the Day of the Repose and Second Uncovering of the Relics of Saint Seraphim of Sarov (Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh)

 

Saint Sophrony of Essex on Saint Seraphim of Sarov

 

The Life and Miracles of Seraphim of Sarov: What is True and What is Questionable
 

The Authenticity of the Conversation Between St. Seraphim of Sarov and Nicholas Motovilov

  

 

Relics

  

Translation of the Holy Relics of Saint Seraphim of Sarov

  

Film From 19 July 1903 of the Litany With Relics of St. Seraphim of Sarov

  

The Candle of St. Seraphim of Sarov

  

A Handwritten Letter of St. Seraphim of Sarov

 

Patriarch Kyrill Brings Icon Which Belonged To St. Seraphim of Sarov To Ukraine

  

 

Miracles  

 

The Healing Spring of Saint Seraphim of Sarov in Diveyevo 

 

The Holy Canal of the Theotokos at Diveyevo Monastery 

 

The Ascetic of Boston

 

The Exorcism That Led to the Building of a Chapel in Honor of Saint Seraphim of Sarov

 

Saint Iakovos Tsalikes and Saint Seraphim of Sarov in the Land of the Meek

 

When Father Lefteris Kapsomenos Met Saint Seraphim of Sarov

 

Counsels and Teachings

  

On the Acquisition of the Holy Spirit (The Conversation of St. Seraphim of Sarov with Nicholas Motovilov)

 

Why Jesus Came Into the World

 

St. Seraphim of Sarov on Adam in Paradise

 

St. Seraphim of Sarov on the Parable of the Ten Virgins

 

How Saints Responded To Apocalyptic Questions

 

The Benefits of Fasting On Wednesdays and Fridays

 

A Peaceful Soul Generates a Pure Heart

  

Saint Seraphim of Sarov on Despair

  

 

People and Places Related to St. Seraphim

  

Sarov: The Forbidden City

  

Pascha on Mount Athos, Valaam and Sarov

  

The Wondrous Grave of Nicholas Motovilov

 

Our Holy and Venerable Father Seraphim of Vyritsa

  

The Spirits of Diveyevo Nuns Photographed?

 

Saint Martha of Diveyevo (+ 1829)

 

Saint Pelagia the Fool for Christ of Diveyevo (+ 1884)

 

Saint Paraskeva (or Pasha) Ivanovna of Sarov - Diveyevo (+ 1915)

Saint Paraskeva (or Pasha) Ivanovna of Sarov - Diveyevo (+ 1915)

St. Paraskeva of Sarov (Feast Day - September 22)

She came from a peasant family of the Tambov province, and was called Irina. Her parents gave her in marriage and she lived for fifteen years with her husband, without bearing any children. Five years later her husband died, and Irina suffered much. While on a pilgrimage in Kiev, she came to abandon the world forever and decided to devote her life to God alone. In accordance with the providence of God, the landowners expelled her, and for five years she lived in her native village on the street, suffering privation. Finally, she was secretly tonsured with the name Paraskeva in Kiev. 

The Healing Spring of Saint Seraphim of Sarov in Diveyevo

History of the Spring

One and a quarter miles from the (Sarov) monastery was a spring called the Theologian’s Spring, and over it was an icon of St. John the Theologian. Near the spring was the empty cell of the reposed Fr. Dorotheus. Making his way to the far desert past this area, Fr. Seraphim saw the Mother of God below the spring, and on the knoll were Apostles Peter and John. The Mother of God struck the ground with her staff, so that a spring welled up in a fountain of bright water from the earth. Here the Mother of God gave Fr. Seraphim commandments concerning the building of Diveyevo Convent, about which we will speak further in the course of the narrative.

Saint Seraphim of Sarov as a Model for our Lives

St. Seraphim of Sarov (Feast Day - January 2)

By Protopresbyter Fr. George Papavarnavas

The Orthodox Church, as we confess in the Symbol of Faith (Creed), is Catholic because it holds all of uncovered truth, but also because it encompasses the whole world. It is not restricted to a narrow geographic context, nor does it discriminate between sexes, races and nations. It prays for the whole world and its Divine Liturgy is offered for the universe. The Agiologion includes saints from the entire world. The venerable Seraphim was Russian in origin and yet when we study his life we feel him near us, and consider him one of our own, because we have the same faith and the same tradition.

Fatherless at three years old, he grew up with his mother, who taught him to love prayer and the Divine Liturgy. At seventeen he left for Sarov Monastery and at thirty-five he withdrew into the wilderness, where "winged with divine eros" he lived the blessed life of the desert. He loved prayer and asceticism, obedience, silence and humility, and he gained the Grace of the Holy Spirit. He would say that the purpose of our life was the acquisition of the Holy Spirit, and that the foolish virgins of the parable were left out of the bridal chamber because they did not have the Holy Spirit.

In the wilderness we encounter him associating with a bear, which sat near him like a lamb and he would feed it to the mouth. This is testified by a nun who visited him in order to be advised about a certain problem that occupied her and, as she says, when she saw it she almost had a heart attack. But then she was persuaded to feed the bear and felt great joy.

When someone becomes a true person, that is, when they acquire humility and are filled with the Holy Spirit, then they become as innocent and harmless as a little child and the wild beasts are subdued before them and they obey. Creation before the fall of the first Adam was subject to man. After the fall, however, it rebelled against the apostate. The air did not want to breathe in his nostrils, the wells did not want to gush out their water, and the earth did not want to give its fruit. The beasts changed and their tameness became wildness. However, when a person is sanctified and reaches the state of Adam before the fall, creation is subordinate to him and the wild beasts serve him.

The Apostle Paul says that joy and peace are fruits of the Holy Spirit, and whoever has within them the Grace of the Holy Spirit has peace and joy. We see this verified in the person of the venerable Seraphim in a most unequivocal manner. He was a man with a joyful disposition. He tried and exceeded all of his problems, because he believed that others were not obligated to see him sullen and sulky. He truly rejoiced for the gifts of God, for the conquering of life over death, for the presence of visitors at his "little desert" whom he received with the beloved greeting: "Christ is Risen, my joy!" Certainly he felt sorrow and pain for the sins and sorrows of the people, because he had love, but true joy is something deeper. It doesn't abandon a person even during their greatest trials.

He said about inner peace: "Acquire peace in your soul and thousands of people around you will find peace."

Inside the Church we are struggling as individuals to become persons or, to use another expression, we are trying to become persons so we don't become "sulky". The peace of the soul, a smile and a joyful disposition are directly related to internal regeneration and the Holy Spirit.

Source: Ekklesiastiki Paremvasi, "ΟΣΙΟΣ ΣΕΡΑΦΕΙΜ ΤΟΥ ΣΑΡΩΦ (1759 -1833)", January 2000. Translated by John Sanidopoulos.

Translation of the Holy Relics of Saint Seraphim of Sarov (photos)

The Cell in which the relic of St. Seraphim was kept in Sarov until 1903

The Venerable Seraphim of Sarov reposed in 1833 and seventy years later he was canonized by the Russian Church. On July 18, 1903 there were between 200,000 and 300,000 pilgrims in the streets of Sarov as the relics of St. Seraphim were transferred to the Cathedral of the Dormition of the Theotokos. There from the night of July 18th till the next morning there was an all-night vigil in all the churches of Holy Russia.

The Royal Family of Russia in procession

The uncovering of the holy relics of Saint Seraphim of Sarov on July 19, 1903 was attended by many thousands, among them the foremost of the clergy and royalty; the holy Tsar Nicholas II (July 17) was one of the bearers of the relics in procession, and the Grand Duchess Elizabeth (July 18) wrote an eyewitness account of the many miracles that took place. Not only had the Saint foretold the coming of the Tsar to his glorification, and that from joy they would chant "Christ is Risen" in summer, but he had also left a letter "for the fourth sovereign, who will come to Sarov." This was Nicholas II, who was given the letter when he came in 1903; the contents of the letter are not known, but when he had read it, the Tsar and future Martyr, though not a man to show his emotions, was visibly shaken.

Apolytikion in the Fourth Tone

Thou didst love Christ from thy youth, O blessed one, and ardently desiring to work for Him alone, thou didst struggle in the wilderness with constant prayer and labour; and having acquired love for Christ with compunction of heart, thou didst prove to be the beloved favourite of the Mother of God. Wherefore, we cry to thee: Save us by thy prayers, O Seraphim, our holy Father.

Kontakion in the Second Tone

Having left the beauty of the world and what is corrupt therein, O Saint, thou didst settle in the Monastery of Sarov. And having lived there an angelic life, thou wast for many the way unto salvation. Wherefore, Christ hath glorified thee, O Father Seraphim, and hath enriched thee with the gift of healing and miracles. And so we cry to thee: Rejoice, O Seraphim, our holy Father.

The relic of St. Seraphim in Dormition Cathedral

In 1926 the Bolsheviks shut down the Monastery of Sarov and took the larnax which contained the relic of St. Seraphim. They first brought it to Arzamas then to Moscow. There they also brought many other holy relics from all over Russia, where a special committee considered which ones interested them the most. When they reached the coffin of St. Seraphim and opened it, the holy relic was miraculously not found.

Patriarch Alexius in Kazan on January 30, 1991

The holy relic was discovered on January 11, 1991 in the Church of the Virgin of Kazan in St. Petersburg. That night thunder and lightning had crossed the skies of St. Petersburg, and all understood something was happening.

From St. Petersburg the holy relic of St. Seraphim was transferred to Diveyevo in order to fulfill the prophecy of St. Seraphim, who before his repose said that he would find rest in Diveyevo.

Sarov: The Forbidden City

Iconographer Pavel Busalayev takes photos of a model of the monastery at the Sarov Nuclear Museum. The Soviet Union’s first nuclear bomb is in the background.

Andrei Zolotov Jr.

January 31, 2013

RIA Novosti

After an overnight trip from Moscow, the train chugs into a tiny, single-track station and stops at closed metal gates crowned with barbed wire. Some passengers disembark and walk to the nearby checkpoint where soldiers match their IDs against a list of authorized guests; others wait to be checked on board. Beyond the checkpoint’s wobbly turnstile, a billboard rises from the wintery morning darkness: “Sarov – Center of Russia’s Strength and Spirit.”

The city of Sarov, surrounded by a thick forest, is one of the most secretive places in the former Soviet Union – the birthplace of its atomic bomb and still a center of the Russian nuclear industry. But it is also home to one of the country’s most revered monasteries, now inaccessible for pilgrims and manned by just four dedicated monks. In recent years, a long-simmering debate around the city – to open it up or keep it closed – has drawn in a powerful new player, the Russian Orthodox Church.

“Here, people simultaneously pray for peace throughout the world and make things that can blow that very same world to pieces,” Pavel Busalayev, a prominent iconographer, said last month at a gathering where local residents and church-affiliated visitors from Moscow and St. Petersburg met to discuss the city’s dual-identity dilemma.

Nuclear City, Repurposed Church

Sarov disappeared from Soviet maps in 1946, transformed by fiat from a minor provincial town into a key site for the research and development of nuclear weapons – some of which stand on display in a strict-ruled museum. The location was ideal: not too far from Moscow, hidden by woodland, but with functional buildings already in place.

Some of those buildings had once belonged to the sixth largest monastery in pre-revolutionary Russia. Its bell tower still dominates the skyline, but has no bells: It survived only because it was topped with television transmitters, which were removed just last year. The town’s main street barrels through the monastery’s 18th-century compound. The main churches were blown up by Soviet authorities in the 1950s, a quarter-century after the cloister had been closed and converted – first, to a juvenile prison, then to a military factory. One of the churches left standing served in Soviet times as a theater.

Today, Sarov – best known by its longest-lasting Soviet code name, Arzamas-16 – prides itself on facilities such as Russia’s largest supercomputer, Europe’s largest station for laser-induced thermonuclear fusion and Europe’s largest linear particle accelerator. The beating heart of the town is the Russian Federal Nuclear Center – also known by its Soviet-era acronym VNIIEF – which employs about one-fifth of the total population of 92,000.

Sarov the Secret

While Sarov looks like an ordinary Russian town – with architecture ranging from tidy brick buildings and imposing Stalin-era facades to late-Soviet blandness and shiny plastic-faced shops – it is still very much one of Russia’s 40 “closed cities,” or ZATOs, an archipelago of restricted-access towns, each overseen by one of several government agencies: state nuclear monopoly Rosatom (as in the case of Sarov), the Defense Ministry, the Russian Space Corporation or the Ministry of Industry and Trade.

According to Igor Babichev, a parliament staffer and the leading authority on ZATOs, the closed cities are home to 1,269,948 Russians, or a little under 1 percent of the country’s population. Their security regimes vary greatly, but Sarov’s is one of the strictest.

The off-limits area surrounding Sarov – a total of 232 square kilometers – is ringed by two parallel, barbed-wire fences. Between them lies a no-man’s land of upturned soil, where footprints are easily visible and underground sensors register any unauthorized movement.

To this day, VNIIEF employees with a security clearance cannot travel to countries other than Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine unless on officially sanctioned business trips. All other foreign travel can take place only in locally organized groups accompanied by an officer of the Federal Security Service (FSB). Foreign scientists who get official permission to visit Sarov cannot bring along their spouses.

Even those Sarov residents who don’t work at the center and don’t have other security clearances face restrictions: While they can travel abroad, they can invite only their closest relatives to visit the town.

Church Revival Not So Easy

This near-hermetic state makes it difficult for the Russian Orthodox Church to restore its famed cloister, the Sarov Monastery of the Dormition, to its pre-Soviet glory. In the late 18th and early 19th century, the monastery had been home to one of Russian Christianity’s greatest saints, Seraphim of Sarov, a mystic, healer and preacher of attaining the Holy Spirit through love – hardly a standard bearer for military might. When clerics recovered St. Seraphim’s relics in 1991 from the store rooms of Leningrad’s Museum of Atheism, they could not display them at the monastery, as ordinary people would have been barred from visiting. Instead, the relics went to what eventually became a flourishing convent with hundreds of nuns in Diveyevo, just 40 kilometers from Sarov, which attracted 1.7 million pilgrims last year, according to the convent’s publishing department.

Nonetheless, the Russian Orthodox Church has been slowly working to raise the monastery’s profile for more than a decade. In 2003, some of its church buildings – though not the main one – were restored in time for the centennial of St. Seraphim’s canonization, a celebration attended by many dignitaries, including the Russian church’s then leader, Patriarch Alexy II, and President Vladimir Putin, who has been a major force in boosting the prestige of the Russian Orthodox Church in the country’s life over the past dozen years.

“Ten years ago, neither the monastery, nor the church existed in the minds of [Sarov’s] citizens or the city fathers at all,” said Sergei Chapnin, executive editor of the Journal of the Moscow Patriarchate, who visited the town often in the early 2000s. “We had to explain to them, at length, in a complicated and therapeutic way, that here is a monastery with 300 years of history, let us have respect for it and let the church in.”

Church Welcome, But Barbed Wire Stays

While representatives of the nuclear industry have made some overtures to the church, they have likewise made clear their belief that the city of Sarov must remain closed.

“While speaking of the mission to defend our fatherland, people [who develop and produce nuclear weapons] definitely have some conflict in their souls,” VNIIEF director Valentin Kostyukov told the gathering in December, hinting that the church may help scientists grapple with an aching conscience. “Yes, they are creating weapons of defense, but some internal questions arise – what’s the purpose, what for?”

At the same time, in terms of public access, Kostyukov unequivocally favored keeping Sarov closed.

“Today we see the future of VNIIEF and this territory as closely connected with [their] special status and special assignments,” Kostyukov said. “This will influence the future of the monastery, because a full-blooded life of the monastery cannot be realized here.”

Kostyukov is not alone. Though some Sarov residents acknowledge that the city’s closed status may hinder development, many others regard it as an island of security in a wild, unpredictable world.

“Being part of a closed city gives you a feeling of comfort and protection – that people of this city are all together your family,” said Svetlana Rubtsova, a linguist and tour guide.

That sense was particularly strong in the turbulent 1990s, after the collapse of the Soviet Union stranded ZATOs with little support or funding at a time of melting savings, disappearing food stocks and skyrocketing crime throughout most of Russia. Moreover, Sarov, though administratively linked to the region of Nizhny Novgorod, lies on the territory of Mordovia, whose ethnically non-Russian population had triggered fears of separatism at the time.

“We defended it [Sarov] from chaos,” said Dmitry Sladkov, a VNIIEF advisor and organizer of the December gathering, which was the inaugural meeting of the Sarov Discussion Club. Sladkov, an urban planner by profession, moved to the city from Moscow in 1992, in part to protect his children from what he saw as the negative influence of early post-Soviet disarray.

At the time, democratic reformers wanted to open up all closed cities at once. But a law passed in 1995, the same year Arzamas-16 once again became Sarov, reinforced and redefined ZATOs’ status, keeping them closed, but opening up opportunities for investment – some of which have been questioned as non-transparent. (Those perks were stripped away soon after Putin won his first presidential election in 2000.)

Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the number of closed cities has dropped from 45 to 40, according to Babichev, the parliament expert.

“The number is decreasing, but not quickly,” Babichev said in a telephone interview from Moscow. “It is a form of existence around industries vital to [the country’s] strategic defense tasks that, so far, continues to be in demand.”

The Downsides of Secrecy

The attachment to ZATOs’ closed status on the part of residents and government officials does not mean the strict rules go unquestioned.

In a 2008 article, Sladkov, the urban planner, wrote that security services have become more intrusive in recent years. While in Soviet times the KGB had been secondary to the scientists and engineers, whose work they protected, he said, in recent years many scientists have complained about excessive new limitations imposed by the FSB.

“Defense industry employees with security clearance see well which measures are necessary to protect genuine security and which only to maintain the influence of the secret services,” he wrote.

Sladkov and others have also pointed out that the secrecy and travel restrictions scare away young scientists, although Kostyukov, VNIIEF’s director, said 32 percent of the center’s 18,500 employees are under 35.

“Physical limitations on travelling abroad are probably wrong,” said Andrei Bezyusyak, a young researcher and engineer who came to VNIIEF as an intern from Moscow’s prestigious Bauman Technical University, fell in love with the work and stayed. “We live in a world of free-flowing information, and if you really want to steal something and work for someone else, there are ways of doing it other than going somewhere far away to hand something over. It’s silly.”

Meanwhile, the debates about the city’s future trundle on.

“Quite a substantial part of the territory of Russia is closed,” said Alexei Golubev, Sarov’s mayor, who also chairs the association of Rosatom’s closed cities. “I want to understand: Is this a norm of our life, and should we eventually come to a closed society that is structured, segmented and where the mobility is low, while only the big cities will be global cities with global citizens living in them? In my opinion, Russia needs to learn to live in an open society. All the problems connected with terrorism or nationalism notwithstanding, the path to closed-ness is leading us nowhere.”

Saint Seraphim the Wonderworker of Sarov (+ 1833)

St. Seraphim of Sarov (Feast Day - January 2)

Saint Seraphim was born in the town of Kursk in 1759. From tender childhood he was under the protection of the most holy Mother of God, who, when he was nine years old, appeared to him in a vision, and through her icon of Kursk, healed him from a grave sickness from which he had not been expected to recover. At the age of nineteen he entered the monastery of Sarov, where he amazed all with his obedience, his lofty asceticism, and his great humility. In 1780 the Saint was stricken with a sickness which he manfully endured for three years, until our Lady the Theotokos healed him, appearing to him with the Apostles Peter and John. He was tonsured a monk in 1786, being named for the holy Hieromartyr Seraphim, Bishop of Phanarion (Dec. 4), and was ordained deacon a year later. In his unquenchable love for God, he continually added labours to labours, increasing in virtue and prayer with titan strides. Once, during the Divine Liturgy of Holy and Great Thursday, he was counted worthy of a vision of the Lord Jesus Christ, Who appeared encompassed by the heavenly hosts. After this dread vision, he gave himself over to greater labours.

In 1794, Saint Seraphim took up the solitary life in a cell in the forest. This period of extreme asceticism lasted some fifteen years, until 1810. It was at this time that he took upon himself one of the greatest feats of his life. Assailed with despondency and a storm of contrary thoughts raised by the enemy of our salvation, the Saint passed a thousand nights on a rock, continuing in prayer until God gave him complete victory over the enemy. On another occasion, he was assaulted by robbers, who broke his chest and his head with their blows, leaving him almost dead. Here again, he began to recover after an appearance of the most holy Theotokos, who came to him with the Apostles Peter and John, and pointing to Saint Seraphim, uttered those awesome words, "This is one of my kind." In 1810, at the age of fifty; weakened with his more than human struggles, Saint Seraphim returned to the monastery for the third part of his ascetical labours, in which he lived as a recluse until 1825.

For the first five years of his reclusion, he spoke to no one at all, and little is known of this period. After five years, he began receiving visitors little by little, giving counsel and consolation to ailing souls. In 1825, the most holy Theotokos appeared to the Saint and revealed to him that it was pleasing to God that he fully end his seclusion; from this time the number of people who came to see him grew daily. It was also at the command of the holy Virgin that he undertook the spiritual direction of the Diveyevo Convent. He healed bodily ailments, foretold things to come, brought hardened sinners to repentance, and saw clearly the secrets of the heart of those who came to him. Through his utter humility and childlike simplicity, his unrivalled ascetical travails, and his angel-like love for God, he ascended to the holiness and greatness of the ancient God-bearing Fathers and became like Anthony for Egypt, the physician for the whole Russian land. In all, the most holy Theotokos appeared to him twelve times in his life. The last was on Annunciation, 1831, to announce to him that he would soon, enter into his rest. She appeared to him accompanied by twelve virgins-martyrs and monastic saints-with Saint John the Baptist and Saint John the Theologian. With a body ailing and broken from innumerable hardships, and an unspotted soul shining with the light of Heaven, the Saint lived less than two years after this, falling asleep in peace on January 2, 1833, chanting Paschal hymns. On the night of his repose, the righteous Philaret of the Glinsk Hermitage beheld his soul ascending to Heaven in light. Because of the universal testimony to the singular holiness of his life, and the seas of miracles that he performed both in life and after death, his veneration quickly spread beyond the boundaries of the Russian Empire to every corner of the earth. 

Apolytikion in the Fourth Tone
Thou didst love Christ from thy youth, O blessed one, and longing to work for Him alone thou didst struggle in the wilderness with constant prayer and labor. With penitent heart and great love for Christ thou wast favored by the Mother of God. Wherefore we cry to thee: Save us by thy prayers, O Seraphim our venerable Father.

Kontakion in the Second Tone

Having left the beauty of the world and what is corrupt therein, O Saint, thou didst settle in the Monastery of Sarov. And having lived there an angelic life, thou wast for many the way unto salvation. Wherefore, Christ hath glorified thee, O Father Seraphim, and hath enriched thee with the gift of healing and miracles. And so we cry to thee: Rejoice, O Seraphim, our holy Father.

From the Great Synaxarion of Holy Transfiguration Monastery, Brookline, MA.

Why Jesus Came Into the World

Now the virginity of Mary was hidden from the prince of this world, as was also her offspring, and the death of the Lord; three mysteries of renown, which were wrought in silence by God. How, then, was He manifested to the world? A star shone forth in heaven above all the other stars, the light of which was inexpressible, while its novelty struck men with astonishment. And all the rest of the stars, with the sun and moon, formed a chorus to this star, and its light was exceedingly great above them all. And there was agitation felt as to whence this new spectacle came, so unlike to everything else [in the heavens]. Hence every kind of magic was destroyed, and every bond of wickedness disappeared; ignorance was removed, and the old kingdom abolished, God Himself being manifested in human form for the renewal of eternal life. And now that took a beginning which had been prepared by God. Henceforth all things were in a state of tumult, because He meditated the abolition of death.

- St. Ignatius of Antioch (Letter to the Ephesians)

We have, then, now stated in part, as far as it was possible, and as ourselves had been able to understand, the reason of His bodily appearing; that it was in the power of none other to turn the corruptible to incorruption, except the Savior Himself, that had at the beginning also made all things out of nought and that none other could create anew the likeness of God's image for men, save the Image of the Father; and that none other could render the mortal immortal, save our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is the Very Life; and that none other could teach men of the Father, and destroy the worship of idols, save the Word, that orders all things and is alone the true Only-begotten Son of the Father.

- St. Athanasius of Alexandria (On the Incarnation of the Word)

The reasons why Jesus Christ, the Son of God, came into the world are these: 1. The love of God for the human race: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son" (John 3:16). 2. The restoration in fallen humanity of the image and likeness of God, as the holy Church celebrates it: "Man who, being made in the image of God, had become corrupt through sin, and was full of vileness, and had fallen away from the better life Divine, doth the wise Creator restore anew" (First Canon of Matins for the Nativity of Christ). 3. The salvation of men’s souls: "For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved (John 3:17). And so we, in conformance with the purposes of our Redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ, should spend our life in accordance with this Divine teaching, so that through it we may obtain the salvation of our souls.

- St. Seraphim of Sarov (The Reasons Why Jesus Christ Came into the World)

Prayer to the Lord Who was Born

By St. Nikodemos the Hagiorite

Jesus, Son of the Father without mother according to divinity, 

I glorify You the eternal Who is above every entreaty and word.

Jesus, Son of a Mother without father according to humanity, 

I glorify You Who became man for us.

Jesus, Emmanuel unchanged, for You are the Angel-bearer of the great message of salvation, 

I thank You for Your great love for man.

Jesus, spotless Lamb of God, 

I ever confess You, for I am the lost sheep.

Jesus, most-compassionate Comforter, 

make the grace of your Spirit to work within me.

Jesus, new Adam, 

take from me the old man, and establish in me the new.

Jesus, You Who descended to earth, 

make me worthy to have my habitation in the heavens.

Jesus, You Who took on human nature, 

make me a partaker in the grace of theosis.

Jesus, my breath, come to visit me.

How Saints Responded To Apocalyptic Questions

By St. Nikolai Velimirovich

Some misguided men think more about the end of the world than the end of their lives even though it is obvious that for him to whom the end of his life comes the end of the world has come.

A brother standing before St. Seraphim of Sarov continually kept in his mind how he was going to ask the saint about the end of the world. St. Seraphim discerned his thought and said to him: "My joy! You think highly of the wretched Seraphim. How could I know when the end of the world will be and that great day when the Lord will judge the living and the dead and render to each one according to his deeds will be? No, no, this is impossible for me to know!"

And when the saints did not know how will the sinners know? Why should we know that which the Savior Himself did not find beneficial to reveal to us? It is much better to think that our death will come sooner than the end of the world rather than the end of the world before our death.

A Peaceful Soul Generates a Pure Heart

By St. Nikolai Velimirovich

For every man, peace of soul is precious. With those who have attained peace of soul, the body can be in constant motion - in work, in pain - but their souls, affixed to God, always remain in unwavering peace.

St. Seraphim of Sarov teaches: "It is necessary to concern oneself with all means in order to preserve peace of soul and not to be disturbed by the insults of others. That is why it is necessary, at all costs, to restrain yourself from anger with the help of vigilance over one's self, preserving the mind and heart from indecent movements. For preserving peace of soul, it is also necessary to avoid judging others. By not judging and by silence, peace of the soul is preserved. When a man is in such a state of mind, he receives divine revelations. In order for man to be preserved from judging others, he must be vigilant over himself; he must not receive from anyone non-spiritual thoughts and he should be dead toward everything worldly. We must tirelessly guard the heart from indecent thoughts and influences. `With closest custody, guard your heart for in it are the sources of life' (Proverbs 4:23). From perpetual vigilance over the heart, purity is born, in which the Lord is seen according to the words of eternal truth: `Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God'" (Matthew 5:8).

Saint Seraphim of Sarov on Despair

 By St. Seraphim of Sarov

Just as the Lord is concerned about our salvation, so does the devil, the slayer of men, concern himself about bringing the soul of man to despair.

Judas the betrayer was faint-hearted and inexperienced in struggle, which is why the devil, seeing him in a state of despair, attacked and persuaded him to hang himself.

Peter, the formidable rock, falling into great sin and experienced in struggle, did not despair and did not lose the presence of the Spirit, rather he shed bitter tears from a warm heart and, seeing that, the devil fled from him as though burned by fire.

Thus, brethren, the Venerable Antiochus teaches that when despair befalls us, we should not succumb to it but, strengthened and enveloped by Holy Faith, say with great bravery to the cunning spirit [the devil]: "What have you to do with us, O apostate from God, fugitive from heaven and a slave of evil! You are unable to inspire us to do anything; for Christ, the Son of God, has authority over us and over all. And you, O murderer, depart from us! Strengthened by His Honorable Cross, we trample upon your serpent's head."

Animation of St. Seraphim of Sarov

Saint Seraphim and Russia

St. Seraphim of Sarov (Feast Day - January 2)

                                                                By Peter S. Lopukhin

Two hundred twenty-five years ago, on November 20th, 1778, Prokhor Moshnin, a tall, blue-eyed, light red-haired youth, the son of a Kursk builder-contractor, entered the Monastery of Sarov. He was leaving the worldly life because he wished to live constantly and wholly in God. He “loved Christ from his youth” and when yet a boy ten years of age was touched by the grace of the Lord: he was healed by the Mother of God, through her miraculous Icon of the Sign. This icon is now with us, in the Russian Diaspora.

Years passed. The youth Prokhor passed through all the monastic obediences, and eight years later was tonsured a monk with the name Seraphim; later, he was ordained to the rank of hierodeacon, and finally, when he had reached the age of 34, he was elevated to the rank of hieromonk, on the very day, the 20th of November, when he had entered the monastery. He withdrew to a cell in the forest wilderness and began the great, mystical life of a hermit, a man of silence, a stylite. But seventeen years after this, he returned to the monastery and began the new, even more difficult struggle of a recluse, which he bore for ten years. In 1820, he opened the door of his recluse’s cell, but lived for several more years in silence, after which, finally, he began his ultimate struggle of elder, teacher and comforter of the Russian people.

But on January 2nd, 1833, he left Sarov and the people entirely and departed to the Lord God. He serenely, blessedly, fell asleep during prayer, kneeling before the image of the Mother of God. Peacefully did “wretched Seraphim,” as that humble hieromonk of the Monastery of Sarov called himself, leave us, in bast sandals or leather stockings, in a sackcloth cassock, with a leather mantle on his shoulders, a brass cross on his breast, bent over, leaning on a hatchet. Seventy years after his repose, on July 19th, 1903, around his grave gathered, perhaps for the last time, Holy Russia, with its pious Tsar. It gathered there reverently to bow down and kiss the holy relics of “wretched Seraphim.” In ecstasy, Holy Russia chanted “Christ is risen!” and glorified the venerable Seraphim, the beloved chosen one of the Mother of God, who had acquired the love of Christ, the great ascetic and prophet, wonder-worker and theologian, comforter and healer, man of prayer who wept for the Russian people.

Many times did people come to him, and we would teach them attentively and carefully, like a mother, about the kingdom of God, life in God, the meaning of life on earth, and through those with whom he conversed with such love he now tells us that we should live in continual fellowship with God, the Holy Spirit. Faith in God is faith in what He is, and that He is love; and also that there exists an invisible, divine world, eternal and more real than the visible world, and in assuming its nature man prepares himself for life everlasting: “he will not come to judgment, but will pass from death to life.” Man must come to know this world, to become aware of it every time he is touched by it. This touching comes like a good gift, and the venerable Seraphim called this touch “grace.”

The meaning of life, in his words, consists of the acquisition of grace, so that, more and more frequently, and finally as an exalted attainment, we may be ever with God the Holy Spirit, abiding in Him always, becoming His child, a fellow heir with our Lord Jesus Christ. “But how can I know if the divine world has touched me? How can I learn to recognize the grace of the Holy Spirit?,” they would ask the venerable one; and he would point directly at the person he was conversing with and say: “We are in the midst of grace right now,” and he taught them and us that it is recognized by spiritual peace, because the heart is warmed by perfect love, by peaceful, humble, spiritual compunction. “They always said to you, reverend sir, that the meaning of life consists of doing good deeds, keeping the fasts, going to church; but this is not how they taught you,” said the venerable one; and he explained that “these works are only the means for living life in God; these works are merely the oil in the lamp which the flame burns, only the wares we trade in; to amass the capital of grace we must perfect those virtues from which the fire of love will burn more brightly.”

This is the meaning of life, and this is what guided the venerable one. The peace of God, the fire of divine love, the venerable one loved with all his soul, and to live in it and only in it the saint departed for the monastery, for the wilderness hut, for the recluse’s cell; and while he was thus making himself steadfast in spirit, he did not wish either to see or speak with men, avoiding all contact with them. We can conjecture that he so carefully and humbly approached his final struggle as elder, consoler and healer of the people because he had tested himself as to whether he could live with men and among men without breaking his fellowship with God.

When the venerable one ended his reclusion, the faithful, Holy Russia, began to descend upon him from all the ends of the land. He stood before it as a living witness to the peace of God, one who shared therein, a living bearer of the fire of grace and the light of divine love. He received the people with a kiss, blessing them and saying, “Christ is risen!,” and calling them “my joy, my treasure.” In the bright light of love, tender, burning love for the people, his image stands forth in our heart. But while rejoicing in this his love, we must remember that in this feeling there lurks the danger that we will oversimplify his image and liken it more closely to ourselves, to our shallow, short-sighted understanding. Do we not, in rejoicing in his love, begin to forget that this was the love of Christ?

Yes, the last years of his life he lived with us and among us; but let us not forget that for thirty years before this he was not only not with us, but with all his loving closeness to us did not want to speak or even to see us. He is not only “ours,” because he was not raised in our midst. He came to us not because he had any need of us: he came to us for the sake of Christ. In the vision he received during his illness, the Mother of God came to him and aid, “This man is one of us.”

We ought never to forget this. On the day when the doors of his cell were opened, there stood before us both a man and a denizen of heaven, because he lived in the divine world, and from thence he brought his own greetings, his own love and care for sick, weeping and loving hearts. His love, compassion and joy are in no way similar to the analogous moods of ordinary men who are good, yet of the soul, not the spirit. Such men easily fall into sentimentality. In the saint there was not the slightest trace of this feeling. He imposed upon people such struggles, the fulfillment of which, as for example the struggle of voluntary poverty on Manturov, for many long years elicited tears and sufferings from those close to him.

Yet the venerable one was not troubled by such tears. Hearing of the sufferings of the fool-for-Christ’s-sake Pelagia Ivanovna, how neither beatings, nor torments of which it is difficult to hear, were able to break her resolve to be a fool-for-Christ’s-sake, he rejoiced in her strength, but did not embitter her with afflictions. The venerable one not only did not approach life like an ordinary man. He lived as though the laws of natural life had lost their power over him. At a distance of seven miles, he saw how a girl was giving alms, and he prayed, falling prostrate on the ground. This is revealed to us by a witness to this miracle, and we are determined to believe that it was given by the Lord to teach us to glorify the saint in a fitting manner.

Yet this picture of the venerable one will not be complete if we do not consider his encounter with a young officer, traditionally held to be one of the Decembrists, when the saint angrily pushed his hands away: “You plotted such a thing, and now you come to me for a blessing? Get away from me!,” he said to him. This meeting is an encounter between revolution and Holy Russia more than a hundred years ago. And how wrathful Saint Seraphim was, seeing the beginning of that villainy! This was a collision of two world views. “One thing is needful: seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you,” says the icon of the venerable one. “Nay,” the face of the officer replies to him, “what is secondary to you is what is most important for us. What you must hold to, we fashion ourselves, in our own way. You submit yourself and your life to God; we do not submit ourselves to anything or anyone.”

This movement prevailed in Russia for a hundred years. The Tsar was slain; the Patriarch was tortured; the people enslaved. But why did this have to be so? Where was the Holy Russia which so loved the venerable one? Its history and life were pushed into the background by secular Russia. This was also Russia, but not profoundly so: a Russia of the soul, not the spirit; of the secular world, not the Church. The venerable Seraphim was a contemporary of Pushkin, Lermontov, Tiutchev, and others. Studying their lives, one would never know that the venerable Seraphim lived at that time, and that Holy Russia, many millions strong, knew him and journeyed thousands of miles to meet him. The writers and poets did not know him as a living man; but seventy years passed, and all of Holy Russia came together with the pious Tsar to kiss his bones and chant in ecstasy, “Christ is risen!”

This secular, soulful Russia, is not alien to the Church. In the writings of Pushkin and Lermontov there are moments of religious inspiration; but all of these are lacking in depth. The Lord Jesus Christ said: “He who is not against you, is for you.” Who will say that this Russia was against? Nay, but on another occasion the Lord also said: “He who is not with you, is against you.” This means that if at the moment when the confession of the Faith is required, a man or society or nation does not have the strength to say, “Yes, I am with you, Lord!” They have apostasized from Him, they are against Him. Soulful, shallow Russia, spiritually indolent, lukewarm, and not fiery, was unable to say this “Yes.”

The venerable one foresaw the great storm and trials of Russia, and said that the Lord would save Russia. He said that, in the eyes of the Lord, there is no better national life than that which is governed by a pious, Orthodox king, that for such a Russia do all the martyrs, righteous ones and saints pray. Of such a Russia did the venerable one speak in spiritual ecstasy, leaping about and clapping his hands, as King David did before the Ark of the Covenant. Such a Russia does not now exist. Or have these men of prayer turned away from us? But what do they want from us? They want what the venerable Seraphim desired and taught. He expected faith from us; he wanted, first and foremost, that we seek the divine world, the kingdom of God and His righteousness, as Christ said in the Gospel (Mt. 6:33). He wants us to submit to this goal ourselves, our thoughts and desires, so that in our life we are not guided by our senses, by our passions and sympathies, but on the contrary, that we eradicate or recast them according to the voice of the righteousness of God. He expects struggle from us, expects commitment to God, expects that we will be fiery, and not lukewarm, spiritual, and not merely soulful. The Lord God has need of men! The righteous pray for us; the venerable Seraphim prays for Russia, and the Lord wishes to save it; but He has need of men, and all the more of Orthodox men, because without them Orthodox Holy Russia cannot be established.

The venerable one calls us to the straight path which is faithful and without compromise. Let us follow him. And when questioned, “Are you with the Church? Are you on the side of righteousness?,” let us answer steadfastly in the affirmative, “Yes!” This is the first and only thing needful, and everything else “will be added unto us,” says Christ.

The content, in brief, of a speech delivered in Belgrade at the solemn assembly of the Brotherhood of Saint Seraphim, on January 15th, 1933.

 

The Ascetic of Boston

Our cities too now have beheld some images of Orthodox witness, at times concealed from the crudeness of worldliness, but strong enough to act as the Gospel leaven.

There lived in Boston in the second decade of the twentieth century a young man by the name of Nikolai Panteleimonov. He was an emigrant from Imperial Russia and possessed the treasure, as he regarded it, of all five volumes of the Philokalia, and many other spiritual books. And he occupied himself in living what these books taught, leading a life of great asceticism as directed by the Orthodox Church. But one day he fell into some grave sin, and upon hearing his confession, the priest put upon him a very severe penance of several hundred, if not thousand, prostrations a day for at least a year. Before this period was over the priest died - and the conscientious young man accepted the uncomplete penance for life.

He worked nights in a factory, and his days he spent locked in his dark attic room in extensive spiritual exercises and long fervent prayer with tears. He would go out for a breath of fresh air only after dusk, roaming the foggy streets. His whole life long he ate nothing but unpeeled boiled potatoes, and salted herring, and he drank nothing but weak tea. Even though his later years were somewhat lax, his whole life was a podvig. In his later years he was made a deacon, but for some reason, despite his absolute devotion to the Church and its every service, he was not in favor. He died a poor man in a city hospital, having himself made all the arrangement for his burial years before.

Saint Seraphim of Sarov

In his earlier years, as he later confessed, when he daily made thousands of prostrations, weeping in repentance and experiencing the power of unseen spirits, he was granted visions of St. Seraphim of Sarov. The first time he saw St. Seraphim was at Harvard Square in Cambridge, when he was coming up from the subway, not knowing which way to go find Russian people. He had taken it upon himself to help the poor monks on Mt. Athos by selling their icons to Orthodox Bostonians. In despair he hesitated, not knowing which street to take, when all of a sudden at some distance from him he saw an old man in full monastic habit, in whom he immediately recognized the dearly-beloved image of St. Seraphim. The Saint was looking at him in a friendly manner and was indicating with his hand the direction to take, even going a little way himself. He followed the Saint along Massachusetts Avenue towards Boston. But soon the figure of the Saint, who several times turned back to see if Fr. Nikolai was following, disappeared. In this miraculous way Fr. Nikolai came to very good and pious people who bought the icons he was carrying to sell. The second time the Saint appeared to him was under circumstances unknown to us. The Saint appeared in an area of crowded Tremont Street downtown, motioning for Fr. Nikolai to follow him. The Saint looked very tall and moved swiftly, walking so fast on the other side of the street that Fr. Nikolai could hardly keep up with him; finally, absolutely exhausted, he lost sight of him.

All his life Fr. Nikolai was preparing himself for a monastic life, but never actually entered a monastery, in obedience to the misleading advice of his lay-priest "staretz" who told him the monastic life was too lax.

(Excerpted from: “A Pilgrimage to the Orthodox Holy Places of America: The Fifth Pilgrimage” Orthodox Word, Apr-June, 1967, p. 31-32.)

Exit of Harvard Square subway today

Tremont Street, Boston, 1910-1920

[Any further information on Nikolai Panteleimonov would be appreciated. Unfortunately he seems to be lost to history as I contacted Saint Herman Monastery in Platina, California who publishes Orthodox Word and no one knew anything about him, including Abbot Herman. The article went on to speak of Holy Transfiguration Monastery in Brookline, Massachusetts, so I contacted them as well and they had never heard of him before either. As the article was written 42 years ago, this does not surprise me. - J.S.]